In our western society today we are fed with a steady flow of information via soundwaves and the diversity is immense. Many of the producers of these waves tries to get the focus of our attention through being a little bit louder than the others (or more spectacular), this is a secret to nobody.
When listening to chambermusic we can sometimes experience an effect which is great in all it's simplicity. When we start to listen actively to something as interesting (and attention catching) as a good performance the feeling of participation in the act of making art makes us feel as important in this process as the actual performers, (this is in fact true in a philosophical way?) thus enhancing the feeling of closeness to the music and the feeling of climbing into a somewhat different world than our everyday reality, atleast something like a change of perspective.
What is actually happening when a good speaker uses that sudden little pause so as to catch our attention? The speaker demands of us to listen and participate (should we have understood there what will be said next?) - Is this one of the clues to make us all feel participating ?
It think we will soon need to change our "city lives" sound environment into something more stimulating our Listening as opposed to our "recieving sounds" before the only possibility is to walk around half the day with earplugs to save our curiosity for sound. What happens if there is no stimulation to participate? Very scary indeed if You translate this to society ...
In our orchestras today we musicians often sit with an attitude of being already filled with sound, not "lusting" for more sound, the conductors respons is too often (natural reaction) trying to fire us up - make us play MORE (read more active) instead of helping us find what is so interesting to listen to in the music, sadly NOT bidding the audience to participate either, in fact robbing them of this wonder and presenting just another sound feed, another quantity killing quality SOUND.
